Anyone live near a windfarm?

[square1]

I also don't mind the lights at night. Actually find it relaxing,

Do they flash to the beat of Bowie's Fame? Ours do!

 

[CloverKnollFarms]

My folks have some adjacent to their farm...the closest is about a half mile and you can hear its "swooshing" on their front porch. Personally I think they are an eyesore. At night the horizon is just a sea of red flashing LED lights now.

Used to be a pretty and pristine farm area and peaceful hunting land. Now it looks very industrial. I wouldn't buy land near them... I might get it cheap, but have a hard time selling it

 

[HawkinsHollow]

These farms are all over Michigan's thumb, they are an eye sore. You're a proponent of renewable resources, what about the projected 700k + tons of blades that cannot be recycled and end up in land fills over the next decade or so? They take up space both while operating and in the mountains of landfill sites.

Your concerns have already been addressed.

Carbon Rivers Makes Wind Turbine Blade Recycling and Upcycling a Reality With Support From DOE

Company Commercializes the Only Currently-Available Technology that can Recycle Fiberglass From Decommissioned Wind Turbine Blades

www.energy.gov

There are pros and cons to everything. We need to start looking towards a future where fossil fuels are not viable for a number of different reasons. Just because you are going to be dead and gone when that day arrives doesn't mean it is not a worthy quest.

 

[oldnslo]

Interesting comment made by a poster on being a proponent of renewable energy but not in my backyard. That seems to be an all to common issue where it is OK in someone else’s backyard and they suffer while I can feel good.

 

[oldnslo]

Whatever the other pros and cons are related to windmills, they don’t necessarily take farmland out of production. A good example is the Texas panhandle around Amarillo. Tens of thousands of acres of land are farmed for wheat and cotton, all of which also do double duty as wind farms that stretch on for miles.

They may not take the whole field out of production like solar panels do but if each tower takes an acre that land is out of production.

I have farmed around power poles going across a field and they are inconvenient especially with row crop like corn since you harvest the rows vs wheat field you can cut in any direction.

I can’t blame the farmers IF repeat IF they were given the choice to participate since it would provide a known income for a period of time. You don’t get that growing crops.

 

[dodge man]

I am retired as a land surveyor and worked on a 60 unit wind farm the last year before I retired mostly doing construction staking. For the power they generate they take up less farm ground than solar. There is a road going in and just a circle around the turbine. During construction the impact is larger, there is a lot of traffic. As I recall the one I worked on had two hundred workers some days.

My personal opinion, the only issue is the visual. Shadow flicker and the noise is non existent unless you are close. The one I worked on isn’t lighted at night unless a radar unit detects an airplane in the area. After it was built I drove to nearby homes and I just couldn’t hear them.

My opinion on them in general has soured on them. The one I worked has had problems. The main bearings needing replaced, one blade ruined by a lighting strike, another one caught fire and burned the house out at the top. I think 20 of the 60 have had problems, maybe more.

They advance slowly sometimes. The one I worked on was about 15 years from planning and signing landowners to being built.

 

[HawkinsHollow]

Interesting comment made by a poster on being a proponent of renewable energy but not in my backyard. That seems to be an all to common issue where it is OK in someone else’s backyard and they suffer while I can feel good.

That's me, Mr. NIMBY!!

 

[jyoutz]

They may not take the whole field out of production like solar panels do but if each tower takes an acre that land is out of production.

I have farmed around power poles going across a field and they are inconvenient especially with row crop like corn since you harvest the rows vs wheat field you can cut in any direction.

I can’t blame the farmers IF repeat IF they were given the choice to participate since it would provide a known income for a period of time. You don’t get that growing crops.

From casual observation, the crops grow very near the tower base and the towers don’t use an acre of ground.

 

[HawkinsHollow]

Interesting comment made by a poster on being a proponent of renewable energy but not in my backyard. That seems to be an all to common issue where it is OK in someone else’s backyard and they suffer while I can feel good.

But to be fair, we all have a little bit of Mr. NIMBY in us. You sound like someone that touts the benefits of burning fossil fuels, but I highly doubt you would like to live next to an oil refinery would you? What about a mountain top removal coal mine? Or would you let them put a gas pipeline through your property?

 

[gsganzer]

I got a call back from a county commissioner and it's his understanding the solar project replaced the wind. He was approached by the wind company about leasing his land early on and he declined. Some of his neighbors did sign on but were later notified that the wind project changed to solar.

I called the energy company a bunch of times and it's just automated and dumps you to voicemail. Of course, they never call you back. However, one of the calls, I selected "Landowner looking to lease" and I immediately got a live person. Funny how that works. I asked the person if the windfarm portion of the project was still active and he went and checked. He came back on and told me he only saw the solar as being active. We've been doing AI searches and it only refers to the solar part of the project, but it's common for different assets of a project to get sold to other entities as they progress, further complicating the research process.

The wind farms have really lost favor in Oklahoma, with a nearby project in McIntosh County being scrapped due to public opposition. However, I need something definitive to put this to rest or it's a deal breaker. We have 7 more days to get our answers.

From my research, the FAA filing listed the proposed turbines to be 650' tall. Probably 500' tower plus the blade length. These aren't something you can just turn your back to and ignore they're there. That's the issue I have with wind power. I'm all for land-owner rights, but this isn't the same as someone painting their house an ugly color or having broke down cars on their front lawn. This is something that people see for 10's- 100's of miles, 24/7/365, day or night.

What's ironic, is I work in the power generation industry commissioning simple-cycle and combined-cycle power plants.

 

[oldnslo]

But to be fair, we all have a little bit of Mr. NIMBY in us. You sound like someone that touts the benefits of burning fossil fuels, but I highly doubt you would like to live next to an oil refinery would you? What about a mountain top removal coal mine? Or would you let them put a gas pipeline through your property?

I agree on Mr NIMBY in all of us and believe there is a place for most power generation styles. I don’t believe closing coal plants is correct nor do I believe that wind and solar will totally replace coal. I try to analyze things on the basis of what is best for that area and the people in that area. If I lived in an of coal mining I certainly wouldn’t be surprised to have a coal mine next door and would expect others in the area to feel the same way.

 

[oldnslo]

From casual observation, the crops grow very near the tower base and the towers don’t use an acre of ground.

Might be different rules state to state but in Illinois and Iowa all of the towers have access road plus fair sized unplanted zone around each tower. My guesstimate of an acre was just that a guess. But if only half acre 500 towers is 250 acres gone.

 

[MossRoad]

Might be different rules state to state but in Illinois and Iowa all of the towers have access road plus fair sized unplanted zone around each tower. My guesstimate of an acre was just that a guess. But if only half acre 500 towers is 250 acres gone.

Well, ask the farmer....

Projected average of bushels of corn per acre for 2025 is 188.8.
Today's price of corn is $4.27 per acre bushel.
That comes out to $806.176 per acre before ANY costs.
So subtract cost of, seed, pesticides, herbicides, fuel, machinery costs, taxes, etc...

Then consider this...
Farmers are expected to lose about 85 cents per bushel this year.
That's bleak!

Projected Farm Income for 2025: Importance of Rental Arrangements on Farm Income - farmdoc daily

Gary Schnitkey, Carl Zulauf, Nick Paulson, and Brad Zwilling - Gary Schnitkey - Income projections suggest 2025 will be another low-income year, resulting in financial deterioration on many farms. Net income for 2025 is projected for a representative 1,500-acre farm with 20% owned, 40%...

farmdocdaily.illinois.edu

Now consider this...

from here:

Would You Put a Wind Turbine on Your Farm? - Offrange

More than 90 percent of land-based wind turbines operate on private farmland. But when a wind company comes calling, the response from farmers and their neighbors can be hard to predict.

ambrook.com

On average, farmers who add turbines to their land make between $8,000 and $33,000 per year, according to a report by the USDA that looked at wind energy costs between 2011 and 2020. In another study, the same USDA researchers found that between 2012 and 2017, 94 percent of farmland remained agricultural in its primary use after a turbine was placed on the property.

John Dollinger of Grundy County, Illinois, has 10 turbines spread across his family’s 800 acres of farmland. A wind company started paying him an annual $10,000 per turbine around a decade ago when the contracts were signed. The annual pay goes up with the consumer price index each year — now, each turbine brings in around $12,000 per year.

 

[gsganzer]

I'll love to see a study that looks at the consumption of materials per megawatt (or megawatt hour) for the various energy technologies. In most things, there's efficiency in scale. The most modern gas turbines generate approximately 400 megawatts. When you add heat recovery, you can generate another 50% or about 200 megawatts with a steam turbine, so 600 megawatts in combined cycle. Most combined cycle plants are usually a 2 on 1 or 3 on 1 design, meaning 2 or 3 turbine/heat recovery units feeding a common steam turbine. So, a typical combined cycle complex puts out 600-1800MW.

The modern wind turbines have a maximum capacity of 3.4MW. So, you'd need 176, 352 or 528 to match the various combined cycle plant outputs (assuming the wind turbines are all at max capacity). Then add in that almost every wind turbine has a transformer sitting at the base, wiring to the grid and roads.

I can't help but think that with a wind turbine, the fuel is free, but you're inefficiently using some other finite raw material. Maybe I'm wrong.

 

[dodge man]

When I was working on that wind farm before I retired I did some research. It looked like a wind farm became “green” after a few years. By that I men the pollution from building the wind farm is offset by the lack of pollution from the wind energy.

One thing I learned is bird strikes. There is data for example that says house cats kill more birds than wind turbines. It’s true your house cats kill more but a cat isn’t going to drop an Eagle or hawk. They actually have bird cadaver dogs on this wind farm. They mow a few lines in the crops then the dogs sniff out dead birds. They pick them up, note them then stick them in a freezer. I think they require more maintenance then you think.

 

[jmc]

As far as the seller sandbagging the OP on disclosure of an impending "public nuisance", zoning laws around here require posted signs visible on that property that a rezoning petition is being considered. Also, some pubic action requires adjacent property owners to be notified. So, if your county has zoning, you may be in luck. If your county doesn't have zoning, well, it not always about the gubermint infringing on your property rights.

 

[jmc]

When wind turbines started to become commonplace in the US, social media was awash in videos chronicling the upfront energy required to build these windfarms. Components shipped in from afar; ground infrastructure costs to anchor them, resources to erect them, etc. Seemed like an orchestrated movement to infer all that upfront energy would never be offset by the lifetime of wind energy in return. Missing from that orchestrated movement was any mention of keeping the standing militaries required to keep the oil flowing from corrupt countries half way around the globe. They ain't cheap.

 

[tradosaurus]

I went back to my hometown near Amarillo, after being away for 20 yrs. I saw thousands of wind turbines and it really destroyed the scenery in my eyes.
I would NEVER want to live near them.
Be thankful you found out before signing your contract.

 

[gsganzer]

I went back to my hometown near Amarillo, after being away for 20 yrs. I saw thousands of wind turbines and it really destroyed the scenery in my eyes.
I would NEVER want to live near them.
Be thankful you found out before signing your contract.

In Amarillo, you can see for miles... and miles... and miles...

I know what your saying. Same with around Sweetwater and near Vernon. I was driving back from Borger at night and went through the Vernon area windfarm. I found the blinking red lights to be absolutely distracting and annoying. Bad enough that I'm not sure I'd even be able to sit outside at night. Maybe folks get used to them.

 

[gsganzer]

I got a call back from a county commissioner and it's his understanding the solar project replaced the wind. He was approached by the wind company about leasing his land early on and he declined. Some of his neighbors did sign on but were later notified that the wind project changed to solar.

I also sent some emails to the Oklahoma Corporation Commission commissioners. This is the group that seems to do all the coordination and permitting for these projects. I spent some time rabbit holing on their website and I couldn't find anything suggesting the wind farm. It's starting to look like it swapped to solar and battery storage instead. Fingers crossed that I get a response with definitive answers.

I can't believe how this property purchase spun a 180. We were rolling along in unbelievable bliss, until I got a wild hair to Google something.

I'm going to be there tomorrow and Friday with one of my buddies. We're going to do some heavy snooping. Probably stop in at a local establishment and chat the locals to see what we can learn.